Portable digital computing devices are becoming increasingly pervasive in modern culture. Such devices, including mobile telephones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), portable mp3 players, digital cameras and camcorders, and portable video game players, allow their users to carry tremendous amounts of digital information on their person with very little inconvenience. These devices are often optimized for portability, placing great emphasis on small form factors and low power consumption.
In achieving these design features, sacrifices in terms of usability have been made. Displays on such devices are often very small, when they are even present. Easy functionality is typically limited to a very few select features accessed through several primary buttons, while less frequently used options are buried deep within menus and submenus, accessed by navigating menus on the tiny integrated display. Additionally, these devices typically offer only one method of access to the user's stored digital data: digital cameras allow the user to view the picture you took on the tiny embedded LCD screen; mp3 players will allow the user to play a stored song; and a PDA will allow the user to view a compressed view of his or her schedule for the day.
Often the sole method available to a user for accessing his digital data is by connecting the device directly to a computer, and using specialized software to interface with the device, move the data to the computer. There are undesirable limitations inherent in this solution, however. In order to make use of the data, it often must be copied to the computer itself, which leaves the user's data in multiple locations. Interfacing with the computer may require a dedicated piece of software or hardware, which limits where the user can make use of his data. And some devices do not even offer this limited option to their users; data that enters such a device is inaccessible, beyond the tools built into the device itself.
Moreover, having access to his or her data only via a single desktop computer has negative implications for the utility of these devices in a social context. A user may wish to share a digital picture with a friend, but cannot do so immediately or in a social setting; he or she must return to their base computer and forward it to their friend some other time. The user might want to let a friend listen to a new song, but would be limited to handing over their mp3 player and headphones; two people cannot listen at once via a pair of earphones. Two friends might want to play a game together, but sharing a single PDA is impractical.
Some means to allow user to use, share, and manipulate content stored on an electronic device, as well as to more easily access functionality of, or appropriate to, their device is desirable.